


you can't upcast a spell from a magic item

by PulsarNyx



Category: High Rollers DnD (Web Series)
Genre: Minor Qillek "Quill" Ad Khollar/Lucius Virion-Elluin Elenasto, Other, Wings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-15
Updated: 2020-11-15
Packaged: 2021-03-10 07:40:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,846
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27579959
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PulsarNyx/pseuds/PulsarNyx
Summary: based on this here tumblr post (https://makkuro-ookami.tumblr.com/post/634663299366174720/if-quills-fly-spell-looked-like-the-other-wing#notes)or: fly has a range of touch, not self. the stormchaser crew gets their wings.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 16





	you can't upcast a spell from a magic item

**Author's Note:**

> Note: I have taken a great many liberties with the future timeline of Aerois and for that I apologize.  
> Such liberties include:  
> \- asshole aasimar mercenary  
> \- the existence of a Hadar rift that spatially expands cliffs  
> \- wyvern hydra  
> \- hadar as a goo patron  
> \- second, slightly larger asshole aasimar mercenary  
> \- aarakocra have arms and wings

It takes around thirty sessions after he gets his wings, two more close scrapes with death (alongside one extremely dead aasimar mercenary, courtesy of Aila), and another Tiangong shard for ~~Tom~~ Qillek to realize that he can cast Fly on other people.

The party is below a massive overhang, several hundred feet up, the rock made slick by the pouring rain. Quill stares up at the massive rock formation as the rest of the party plots their next move.

"Sentry, could you get all big and carry us all up?"

Nova experimentally blasts the overhang at one of its thicker points. Quill flinches as a boulder the size of his whole body falls to the ground thirty feet away. "Lucius, the cliff wouldn't support all our weight. And it's too far away for me to portal to."

Flash of inspiration. Quill turns to the rest of the party.

"I can use the ring to cast Fly on Sentry, and she can carry all of us up the cliff."

"That would work!"

_In a higher plane of existence, there is a small misunderstanding about casting multiple Concentration spells on the same creature that is swiftly resolved._

With a burst of golden energy from her matrix, Sentry's form doubles in size, metallic plates sliding into place and the wooden musculature underneath growing to fill the space. At the same moment, Quill lets the thin bands of Lady Duskwillow's ring flow outward, skeins of magic latching onto Sentry's back, pulling her still-expanding form outwards into metallic spires - into wings.

Sentry's wings large and imposing, cut from the same darkish wood and dull silvery metal that makes up the rest of her form. In lieu of feathers, large longsword-sized attachments hang from vine-covered wooden spines, glowing faintly with the soft purple of her matrix and the radiant gold of the Prime.

For a moment, everyone stares in stunned silence. Lucius and Nova gush over how cool Sentry's wings look. Aila gets everyone back on track. Sentry carries everyone over the cliff. The rift is closed. The adventure continues.

_Since Fly isn't a cleric spell, Tom can't prepare it normally. Trott considers learning it briefly, but it doesn't feel very Lucius. An agreement is made - everyone has to describe what their wings look like when Quill casts it on them._

* * *

Nova gets her wings trying to read the small print.

They're in a hidden temple to Siaska - a tall, vertical spire with about a dozen elevators rendered inoperable due to power loss. 

Quill peers through the dull indigo light, at a small circular script written into the hemispherical ceiling of the room they're in.

"I can't read it, it's in a language I can't recognize. It also looks like there's some switches up there to flip."

Nova perks up. "Ooh! I can read all languages now! Quill, can you get me up there?"

Quill nods and casts Fly. 

Her wings are nearly unrecognizable as such - pale blue cylindrical spikes made of holographic light floating about half an inch away from her dark blue coat, the color of Tiangong's magic and the stars in her hair. Quill sees her face scrunch up in concentration for a moment, and a couple of the larger downward-facing spines begin to emit energy, causing her to lift off the ground. With a nervous smile, she starts flying toward the ceiling, Quill following shortly behind her.

She takes a few minutes to adjust to the new movement, but once she does, it becomes almost second nature to her - her air genasi heritage quickly acclimating to the floaty, flitty movements her variation of the Fly spell provides. Together, they decipher the puzzle (involving pop song lyrics and a liar's puzzle) and flip the proper switches, causing the entire spire to light up with the gentle aurora-colored light of Siaska. As the ten minute duration ends, she lands gracefully on the crystal floor, the spines flaring outward in a graceful aura around her before dissipating into shards of light. Lucius applauds.

Later, on the airship, Nova asks Quill if he can give her flying lessons sometime, a set of artificial wings already taking form in her mind.

* * *

Aila gets her wings chasing down a dragon.

Well, technically, it's a five-headed hydra-wyvern abomination created by Zarkeera's scientists as a bioweapon, but the distinction between dragon-type creatures and true dragons is lost on everyone except Nova.

Heavily injured from a critical smite from Sentry, the wyvern takes flight - three sets of beating wings lifting it into the air, two burned stumps of necks hanging loosely down as it crashes through the closing aperture, taking off into the sky. Nova grabs Lucius and cuts a path with Tiangong further down the ravine pass, trying to head the hydra off. Sentry jumps forward and stabs Her Majesty's Rose into the creature's back, digging in and hanging on for dear life. Aila attempts the same, but weakened by the wyvern's poison, just slides off one of its tails as the thing flies away. This is where Quill finds her, fresh from failing to trap the wyvern with the now broken observatory doors.

A single glance is exchanged. Aila nods. Quill casts fly.

Aila's wings are resplendent - lightning frozen mid-strike, arching outward, filled by sparking storm clouds and the roaring of thunder. With a single beat, she takes off with a massive burst of wind, hammer already in striking position as she follows after the fleeing creature, Quill left in her wake.

They fight like that for a while - Quill and Aila harassing the creature with spells and drive-by hammer blows, Nova and Lucius Far Stepping along and peppering the wyvern with elemental blasts, Sentry climbing along its spined back and preventing its heads from regrowing whenever they do enough damage to sever one.

Eventually, as the hydra crests the last mountains of the ravine - now missing three wings, both tails, and down to its last head - Aila messages Quill to drop the Fly spell as she deftly positions herself directly above the dragon.

There is a clap of thunder as the spell drops. Instead of simply fading back into the Weave, the lightning courses into Aila's body, flowing up her arms and into her raised hammer. The clouds blow outwards, forming a ring-like structure that slams Aila downward to her target - the wyvern's head. With a single, savage blow, the hydra is driven a hundred feet down to the ravine's floor, shattering the ground as Aila lands above it, the Howling Tempest cutting clean through its neck.

After escaping the ensuing avalanches, Sentry and Quill (with Protection from Energy) dig around the snow and take the dragon skull as a trophy, at Aila's insistence.

* * *

They're fighting Hadar-touched with the dragonborn when it happens.

Quill knows they've got them on the ropes - Lucius set up an ingenious trap in the sewers using a Freezing Sphere spell, and the two scimitar-wielding Hadar-touched are trapped beneath the ice. The other three (two with some form of organic harpoon, one a mage with lasers) managed to flee into the evacuated street, but their escape is blocked by two dragonborn shield lines to the north and south. Even with Lucius and Nova still in the sewers maintaining the thick layer of ice and counterspelling the teleports, Quill is confident.

The mage touches the two other Hadar-touched and his hands flash a deep and sickening red. Without warning, the three Hadar-touched simply start floating upward, the mage's hands coursing with force energy and the harpooners pointing their arms downward.

The winged(!) dragonborn wizard they're travelling with (Xiirka, was it?) curses under her breath and taps Sentry on the shoulder. Quill watches as she floats upward, before stopping abruptly and looking over her shoulder, a bit confused. She shrugs and moves onwards.

Quill looks at Xiirka. "Is that what the Fly spell normally looks like?"

Xiirka gives him a questioning glance. "Yes. Why would it be any different?"

In response, Quill taps Aila on the shoulder and the two wizards watch as her back erupts with familiar stormy wings. The two melee fighters shoot towards the Hadar-touched, one without her wings.

Xiirka makes a clicking sound with her tongue. "Strange. Might be your concept of magic and flight are inextricably connected. I am to assume that your metal wing is not just for show?"

Quill looks down at the prosthetic Nova made for him and nods. "Huh. I guess so."

They make quick work of the remaining Hadar-touched and get an apology from the Draconis Militarum for the ballista bolts lodged in their airship.

* * *

Lucius gets his wings while falling.

It turns out that the aasimar mercenary that nearly killed Nova and Quill (a nasty piece of work named Fluffy) had a brother, who literally rammed an airship into the Stormchaser in his pursuit for revenge. During the ensuing battle, Lucius (brave, strong, _wonderful_ Lucius) ran for the greatsword-wielding barbarian covered in Armor of Agathys. Unfortunately, the mercenary was wise to his tricks, and instead used Lucius' momentum to toss him over the railing and off the ship, ran for his own airship, and was promptly skewered by three very angry party members making attacks of opportunity. 

Quill didn't take the time to celebrate their victory. Without hesitation, he dove off the airship towards the ground, chasing after Lucius.

A hundred feet above the ground, he spots Lucius, about twenty feet away.

Eighty feet above the ground, he dives towards him.

Sixty feet above the ground, he grabs Lucius in his arms.

Forty feet above the ground, he casts Fly.

Twenty feet above the ground, Lucius gets his wings.

The two are a mere five feet off the ground when they land, the downdraft they leave clearing a large swath of golden grassland as the Armor of Agathys shatters, arctic frost spreading outwards and upwards, prismatic rainbows trailing around the two as shards of ice float gently through the air. Quill is holding Lucius in his arms.

Quill looks at Lucius and catches his breath. Lucius's wings are resplendent - all prisms of ice and flowing streams of acid. They're similar in shape to the butterfly wings he had while under the influence of the Faerie Princess's Crown - large rhomboids of ice angled in such a way to catch the light and split it into color-filled spectra, pale orange acid suspended between them, their surfaces covered with a streaky rainbow pattern like so many soap bubbles. As the spell takes hold, a flower crown takes shape over Lucius's head, made up of the blue and orange gemstone flowers from his Sequestering so long ago. Quill feels a slight illusory weight over his head and knows that an identical crown has appeared there.

Lucius clears his throat. Quill realizes he's staring.

"S-sorry, just... wow."

Lucius chuckles. "Wow, yourself. C'mon, I want to make a grand entrance."

_It is at this point in the initiative that Kim announces that Nova learned Fly during her last level-up. Lucius and Quill meet the rest of their party halfway up to the Stormchaser. There is much rejoicing._


End file.
